


a strange boy and a mysterious girl

by halfway_there_halfway_dead



Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU, Superman - All Media Types, Wonder Woman - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Powers, DCU - Trinity, Gen, Kid Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-14
Updated: 2018-02-14
Packaged: 2019-03-18 04:50:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13674615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/halfway_there_halfway_dead/pseuds/halfway_there_halfway_dead
Summary: Bruce was nine when he first met them.





	a strange boy and a mysterious girl

 

Bruce was nine when he first met them.

 

His parents died a year prior and he was adopted by his ridiculously rich aunt and uncle, Clair and Grant Wayne. One would think it was because they were good people, taking care of their dead sibling’s orphan son, but that was exactly what they wanted the public to think. Truth was they could barely look at him without being reminded that Thomas Wayne had left the family business to marry some low class woman the family never approved of. They couldn’t even stand being in the same room as him for more than five minutes without shooting him a look that told him to go away. But Bruce liked that better than being paraded around like a show dog as his aunt spouted lies about how he would crawl into their bed at night after crying from a nightmare and how oh so supportive they were to their new adopted son.

 

Don’t get him wrong, he’s grateful that they had taken him in even after the fact that his father cut himself off from the family. But he could see why Thomas Wayne wanted out.

 

The one in charge of Bruce’s wellbeing was their butler, Alfred Pennyworth. Bruce wasn’t sure what to think of the man. He seemed to care for him, in a distant sort of way, but Bruce wasn’t sure if that was because Alfred actually cared for him or because he was being paid to. Still, he liked the butler. Alfred usually let him do whatever he wanted, in line with rules and reason, of course.

 

His aunt and uncle’s estate was huge. Their front room was large enough to fit all the people they liked to invite over to flaunt their wealth in their faces. Their dining room and kitchen were just as big. There were 6 bathrooms, two of which were in the basement where a bar and wine cellar resided. And they had about 14 bedrooms. Bruce, for the life of him, could not understand why anyone would need so many bedrooms. There were also a bunch of other rooms that he’d seen like the library, both his aunt and uncle’s studies, and the viewing room where they liked to watch their movies.

 

Though there were tons of rooms to explore in the house, Bruce preferred the woods just behind his aunt and uncle’s estate. That was where he first met them.

 

He met Clark first. Though at the time he hadn’t known his name was Clark. He wouldn’t know that for a very long time.

 

It started like this. Clair and Grant were away in London, something about an important business meeting and how they wouldn’t be back for a week. It was summer time and Bruce remembers exploring the woods, as he usually did, swinging through the foliage with a stick he found in the ground. The terrain was rocky but he roamed this area so many times, he was used to it. He barely got any scrapes anymore. He spent so much time here, sometimes with Alfred, that he saw this as more of a home to him than the mansion ever did. And from all that time spent here, he’d never seen anyone else.

 

Which was why when he heard a shout, he was startled. At first. The shout morphed into some sort of dialogue, too muffled for him to hear clearly. A kid’s voice. He became curious and followed the sound to its source, finding himself in a clearing. In the middle of that clearing was the strangest thing. A boy stood there, back towards him, wearing a white shirt, denim overalls and scuffed shoes. But that wasn’t the strange thing. The boy had some sort of red fabric tied around his neck, which billowed in the breeze behind him, a giant sharpie-d S on it.

 

Bruce remembers hiding in the bushes, watching this strange boy galloping around the woods as he made proclamations of saving people and stopping evil. Even now Bruce can’t say why he didn’t just go up to this boy and introduce himself. It’s been so long since Bruce has had any friends (and those kids from school could hardly count as friends, just more people he had to make small talk with for the sake of Clair and Grant’s network), and being alone for that long must have made him cautious. Maybe he wanted to see if this kid was worth making the effort for.

 

He’s embarrassed to say he watched Clark a few more times before he actually talked to him. It wasn’t every single day but when he did find the boy in the woods, he hid away, just observing. That is until one day the boy with the moppy black hair and bright blue eyes stared straight into his hiding spot for the day and asked, “Why have you been following me?”

 

Bruce stepped out from the bushes, leaves stuck to his hair, cheeks flushed red at being caught, and answered, “What are you doing in the woods?”

 

“Wouldn’t you know?” the boy said, cheekily, still wearing his usual outfit of a white shirt, overalls and the strange red cape. “You’re the one following me.” When Bruce turned away, he said, “If you wanted to play with me, you coulda just asked. I know you were following me from before too.”

 

After the initial embarrassment wore off and after Bruce let his ego deflate enough for him to confess that yes, so maybe he was looking for someone to hang out with, he and Clark became good friends. They would spend hours in the woods together, conjuring up stories and adventures with crazy weird supervillains and damsels that needed saving.

 

Clark never let him know his name though. When Bruce tried to ask for it, he remembers how persistently the boy would insist, “My name is Superman! That’s what the S is for! It’s also a symbol for hope!”

 

“No I mean, your real name,” Bruce would say. “Also, hope doesn’t start with a letter S.”

 

“The word ‘symbol’ does,” the boy said. “S for Symbol for hope,” he giggled.

 

Whenever Bruce would try to say his real name, Clark would refuse to hear it, covering his ears and saying, “No, you can’t tell me or anyone, that would ruin your secret identity! How else are you going to protect your family from the bad guys if they know who you are?”

 

Bruce pointed out that they would recognize his face, since the boy didn’t wear a mask. But the boy said that he would wear glasses when reverting back to his secret identity. Villains were dumb, he justified, so it would be enough to trick them.

 

Since Bruce couldn’t use his real name, in the woods he was Batman.

 

“Batman?” the boy repeated when Bruce came up with it. He remembers how Clark crinkled his nose at the thought of bats. “Why?”

 

“Because bats are scary.”

 

“And you want people to be scared?” he asked, confused.

 

“No,” Bruce said. Memories poured through his head, of a dark alley, of a loud bang, of the smell of iron and smoke. He shook his head. “I want the bad guys to be scared.”

 

Clark had his red cape and Bruce had a black mask that resembled a bat. A crudely made mask he’d cut out from cardboard and gouged eye holes into. He wrapped it around his head with an elastic band. He copied Clark’s cape idea and wrapped black fabric around his neck. Superman and Batman were the finest in the world in those woods.

 

That is until Diana came along.

 

The concept of time to a child is strange. Looking back Bruce knows he and Clark only played together for three to four weeks at most but Bruce felt as though they’d been friends for years. And so when Diana came, Bruce felt almost possessive. Over the woods and over Clark.

 

It started like this. Clark was swinging on the tire swing his dad had set up for them, emulating the feeling of flight, while Bruce was perched on a tree branch. It gave him the best vantage point. Superman and Batman were trying to find the Legion of Doom’s headquarters. Rumor had it that they were building the ultimate doomsday device and it was up to them to stop it.

 

What Bruce found wasn’t the Legion’s headquarters though. It was a mysterious young girl, plastic sword and shield in hand, lasso coiled around her belt loop. Clark was ecstatic to see a new face, always so friendly with people even then. Bruce wasn’t so much. He grabbed the binoculars wrapped around his neck to get a closer look at the girl, warning a hyperactive Clark to stay quiet beside him.

 

“So you want to spy on her like you did on me too?” the boy laughed, nudging him with his elbow.

 

“I’m not spying, I’m observing,” Bruce shot back, shoving Clark in retaliation.

 

“Observing how pretty she is?” he giggled.

 

Bruce shoved the boy again, insisting, “I don’t think she’s—”

 

When he thinks back, that last shove was probably what caused them both to fall in a heap right in front of the battle armored girl. When they looked up, the tip of her plastic sword was in their faces.

 

“Who are you, and why are you spying on me?” she demanded, a strange accent filtering her words. Bruce remembers Clark smirking at him then and saying, “I told you it was spying.”

 

Bruce only replied with a grunt, pushing Clark away. They both stood and dusted themselves off. Clark stared at her with big eyes and an even bigger grin.

 

“I like your sword and shield!” he piped up. The boy gestured at the lasso attached to her hip. “Why do you have a rope?”

 

The girl detached it and held it up, she looked proud as she explained, “It is the Lasso of Truth. Whoever holds or gets trapped by it cannot tell a lie.”

 

“So you have to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth!” Clark chirped, probably remembering something he’d heard from the TV. He held onto the lasso and said, “My name is Superman! The S on my cape stands for a symbol of hope!”

 

Bruce nudged him hard with his elbow and Clark winced. “You’re not supposed to be able to tell a lie when you hold onto that.”

 

“But I’m not telling a lie!” he whined, rubbing his side and glaring at Bruce slightly. “I am Superman!”

 

“Your _real_ name,” Bruce said, hoping that day would finally be the day he learned of Superman’s secret identity.

 

“In the woods my real name _is_ Superman,” the boy answered stubbornly.

 

“Why do you have different names?” she asked.

 

“If the bad guys know your real name or identity, then they’ll hurt the ones you love,” he explained, just as he explained to Bruce what seemed like so long ago.

 

Bruce held onto the lasso and grunted out that he was Batman.

 

He is ashamed to say it took a long time before he could acclimate to Diana’s presence. She called herself Wonder Woman, a warrior, an advocate for peace.

 

“I come from G—” she was saying before she faltered. Bruce remembers how the girl cut herself short, pain in her eyes before she forced a smile and continued, “—from Paradise Island.”

 

Clark’s eyes widened with wonder at that. “That sounds awesome, could we visit it sometime?”

 

The same pain came back with as much intensity as the first time and stayed a while longer as she said softly, “I can’t go back there anymore.”

 

At first Bruce thought the island was just part of Wonder Woman’s story. Bruce had a made up city for Batman and Clark had a made up planet for Superman. He later found out that the island Wonder Woman could never get back to was based off of a real place that Diana herself thought she could never get back to at that age. Her mom and her had just moved from Greece with a job offering she couldn’t refuse. They left everything they ever knew to chase down an opportunity.

 

Bruce’s made up city was based on a city he once knew. He wondered if Clark’s planet Krypton was based off of something he knew too.

 

Bruce may have taken a long time to adjust to the new addition, but Clark certainly didn’t. He enjoyed having someone new to build on their adventures and come up with even more grandiose villains they could beat. Bruce warmed up eventually. And when they fought monsters, demonic cosmic spirits and evil gods, they did it as a trio, as a trinity.

 

By the end of that summer, the three had a tree house up, built with the help of their guardians. It was up high enough that when they huddled on top of its roof, they were well above the tops of the trees and had a perfect view of the sky. It was breathtaking and Bruce remembers the awe in their eyes the moment they glimpsed at it.

 

It was on the last day of their first summer together, curled up under a blanket on the top of their tree house and watching the sun set, did Bruce realize that he still didn’t know their names. No, it wouldn’t be until much later would they finally reveal to him their secret identities. But you know, maybe that was okay. Because as he gazed upon the warm red-orange glow of the descending sun, next to a strange boy and mysterious girl, he realized that, for the first time in a long time, he was happy.

 

 


End file.
